Rand Report

Totoro said:

We were talking about US forces already being alerted. Meaning additional USAF forces in guam and kadena, a few (if not several) carrier groups in vicinity, etc. Invasion is imminent, and everyone knows it kind of situation. Still, it may not pay off to keep a CAP for USAF planes. We're not talking about strategical surprise, but a tactical one. When will strike group A strike, from which direction. Then the next day, or a week after that. There'd be like hundreds of strikes in the first week or two, which can not be intercepted in time by USAF, unless they're already in the air and close by. USN is another story.

It is very likely US wouldn't do anything rash or risky until they've accumulated enough forces in the vicinity of taiwan. So, unless US gets to position all the forces it wants where it wants, before China can organize air strikes (unlikely), there's bound to be little US involvement in the initial stages of the conflict. As time passes, US may very well assemble large enough force so even if we disregard the quality gap, the quantity ratio between available US and chinese planes may not be very large.

We don't know if there's enough present infrastructure to hold majority of PLAAF and PLANAF forces within proper reach of Taiwan. Or, if there is, at what cost? It's one thing using a prepared air force base and another thing using a civilian airport, where sortie generation is likely to be a bit less. Even more so for uprepared runways, etc. (same goes for the Taiwanese operating their planes from the highways and so on)

How many chinese planes would be lost even before main US force is assembled? To gain air superiority one has to fight through a large taiwanese force, a potent air defense network and a navy with very decent air defense capabilities. Granted, a big part of those may be negated with chinese navy and various missiles but still, even a half of the mentioned taiwanese forces would do some serious attrition to any attacker. I don't think it's out of the question that several hundred chinese planes are brought down before air superiority is achieved. (and thats without any US help)

In such a high stakes war there'd be tensions and potential threats on other places of the globe as well. PLAAF will most probably have to spare some of its planes near Korea, Afghanistan, India, etc, etc. There may not be more than a thousand combat planes left for operations against Taiwan, and not all would be fighter planes.

On the other hand, when US forces assemble, we may be looking at several hundred of combat planes, every one being more capable than what chinese can throw in the air. With just Kadena air wings and four carriers (lets say US won't wait to assemble max it could, some 7-8 carries) we're looking at over 300 quality fighter planes. And if USN can provide good enough air cover around Kadena, USAF may decide it's safe enough to house F-22s there, which would give additional quality edge.

In a war of attrition, where Chinese are flying CAS and CAP missions around the clock over Taiwan, and US forces choose the time of their strikes - it's actually more likely US would be the one to have numerical advantage in the air, as well as qualitative. It is actually quite possible Chinese would very quickly learn to just run away and pause their CAS missions. Naturally, that may come very handy to the Taiwanese land army, which would then have the upper hand, since the numbers are on their side versus whatever chinese can land/paradrop/whatever in a given period of time. Not to mention that Chinese forces on Taiwan would not be equipped with heaviest of weaponry, while Taiwanese would enjoy using whatever their have in their arsenal.

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Taiwan scenarios always come down to these matters of time. How long would it take the Chinese to break the ROCAF? How long would it take for the USN to deploy in force? How long does it take for both sides to buildup their forces? How long does it take for hypothetical USAF aircraft to reach Taiwan from Kadena/Guam? How long can either side keep up operations at the inevitably astronomic loss rates they will be facing? Always its about time. In that sense it reminds me of another conflict that had its early stages planned out heavily before it actually happened, WWI. What happened there? Both sides prearranged plans (the Schliffen Plan, Plan 17, the Russian offensive into East Prussia) all failed. So we really can't say with much certainty what could happen.

FriedRiceNSpice said:

The only hint US would need is if Taiwan declares independence... Every other sign would be redundant. If Taiwan declares independence, US will know that within the next two weeks hostilities will ensue. If Taiwan does not, then there will be no hostilities.

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Well it's not that simple. China reserves the right to start a war for other "events" less specific than a declaration of independence. Let's remember that past and current presidents have said that Taiwan is independent of the PRC. Not a UDI but still something that technically falls under the Anti-Secession "Law".

If it really were that simple then Taiwan wouldn't bother taking all the precautions it does.

tphuang said:

you do realize that the Chinese air defense is built to withstand tens of thousands of cruise missiles attacks, right? How many cruise missiles does the US have? Even aside from the HQ-9 and S-300 batteries they have, they have plenty of AD artillery units, small and mobile air defense units against cruise missiles. Assuming B-2 can come in and make their bombs on Chinese air bases and such and go away unscathed every time, there is no guarantee that they can actually put anything out of commission with the number of levels of air defense units available. And even if some things do get destroyed, think about the amount of people available to rebuild these things. If there is one thing they are good at in China, that would be building things. Of course, this cuts on both sides. If China manages to destroy air bases in Kadena and Taiwan, we should expect there to be a lot of rebuild operations going on in those air bases too. We can't expect that those air bases will be out of commission permanently either. And when we talk about hitting these bases, we are not just talking about ballistic missiles attacks. That's a very small part of it. We are talking about WS-2 launches, cruise missiles, air to surface missiles by fighter-bombers, PGMs and such. And even US starts taking liberties with which military installations or even civilian targets they go after, they need to start worrying about their military bases all over the world. I'm specifically talking about the troops in Afghanistan and Iraq. I could be wrong here, but I don't think those bases are designed with Chinese cruise missiles in mind.

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Well, the thing is, the US military doesn't need to destroy every air defense unit, missile launcher, or radar unit China fields. While I do doubt your claims of the ability of China's air defenses to be able to absorb "tens of thousands" of cruise missile attacks, I do know China’s air defenses have become significantly more extensive recently. China does have a top notch air defense system. The issue for the US military is depletion, reducing effective coverage, and spreading of air defense resources. Limiting the amount of things they can actually defend. And forcing China into a defensive posturing. This is currently very doable.

The whole goal would be to not only put China on the defense, but it would also be a contemporary goal to further eliminate their ability to conduct effective operations against Taiwan. Basically shutting down their ability to sustain any kind of invasion, or successfully holding on to any gains. RAND would never address this accurately. How could this be done? Well firstly it would have to be rather quick. Using B-2’s would be a part of it, but yet that as a solution on it’s own is quite inadequate. F-22’s also. Seriously China will not be able to build up any serious force composition to conduct this kind of operation in any secretive fashion. And assymetric strategies will only get you so far. I’m mostly impressed by China’s anti-access strategies, yet they are not yet mature enough to prevent carrier battlegroups from operating in the area in total. Nor could they prevent them throughout an entire conflict as we have means to destroy their anti-access components without using naval air.

China’s anti-access have their own vulnerabilities as well. Not to mention that in order for them to work, they would have to be prepared to attack and go to war with more than one other country in the Western Pacific like Japan, and South Korea. That’s already a complete disadvantage. What the US could bring immediately on day 1 is something I believe China could not fully cope with. In a scenario of growing hositilites leading to an invasion scenario, I’m fully ready to think we would deploy all 4 SSGN platforms fully loaded for battle. That’s a total of 616 battle force cruise missiles plus 12 SSN (12 VLS). If we deployed this small percentage of total US assets, that equals 760 cruise missiles, and you can add coastal B-2 strikes conducted at night. Probably on night 1. Basically in a 24 hour period, we could destroy over 1000 Chinese targets. Those targets would be fuel storage, fuel handling/transport stations, fuel refiners, airfield targets(including tracking radar stations/aircraft on flight lines), important targets (logistics-platforms-support) at naval bases, SAM radars/launchers/support, and probably weapons manufacturers/support services (Chengdu/Shenyang/shipyards), and some Command and control targets, and perhaps some BM sites. I don’t care how robust you think China’s air defenses are. They would not be able to stop much of this, especially if they were on the move to prevent their own losses. Plus with a current force of 4,000 TLAM’s, 3,000 SLAM/SLAM-ER’s, 2,500 AGM-86 ALCM’s, and many other varieties of weapons usable from aircraft, we could do this for a couple of weeks before we brought serious naval air components.

Let me relate one more thing. A war like this would bring other things out. When I went to that Seapower 21 symposium that I’ve brought up in a few threads here, they also discussed using B-1 bombers in the SEAD role. With their extensive jammers/ECM, countermeasures, surveillance capabilities, low level and supersonic speeds, plus the ability to carry a whole lot of AGM-88E’s, it would be well suited to conduct SEAD/DEAD against a nation of robust air defense capabilities. I think they had a country like China in mind over the straits. B-1 would be easily fitted for this with minor modifications. That’s just one point here. Another is the conventional Trident missile from Ohio class submarines. This has been seriously discussed. Do the math. 24 missiles with 12 1 ton high explosive warheads on 2 Ohios equals a lot of destructive and high speed firepower. Those could carry 12 warheads as they are non-nuclear warheads and are not limited by any strategic arms limits. And would be a low cost solution modification for the Ohio Class. China has no defense against this type of solution. And RAND does not address that because they are addressing an area of concern to USAF planners. And again not viewing the context of a war scenario. And I haven’t even got into how the US military would use naval mines against bases in the South China Sea to slow them up from there. This RAND report as such can only go so far. It does make it’s point, but like I said, their own scenario simply doesn’t address the more larger points of strategy. It specifically addresses a naroow subset of possibilites to highlight a concern over the use of 1 component. But simply doesn’t address the larger picture. RAND puts out studies like this for a specific reason. And I'm not sure many understand these scenarios vs. actual real world application.

Those could carry 12 warheads as they are non-nuclear warheads and are not limited by any strategic arms limits.

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Do you seriously think China or any country for that matter would wait for ballistic inbounds to actually hit their targets to see if they're using nuclear/conventional warheads before deciding on a response?

FriedRiceNSpice said:

Do you seriously think China or any country for that matter would wait for ballistic inbounds to actually hit their targets to see if they're using nuclear/conventional warheads before deciding on a response?

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Well that's why I think that this project was rejected for peacetime deployment, ballistic missles arcing towards their targets tend to make people nervous. However if the Tridents are projected to hit airfields and such in Fujian province and not the locations of China's DF-31s etc, the might hold their fire as their ability to retaliate would not be directly threatened. Still not a good idea though.

Finn McCool said:

Well that's why I think that this project was rejected for peacetime deployment, ballistic missles arcing towards their targets tend to make people nervous. However if the Tridents are projected to hit airfields and such in Fujian province and not the locations of China's DF-31s etc, the might hold their fire as their ability to retaliate would not be directly threatened. Still not a good idea though.

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The country has grown to a point that major population concentrations have moved into once remote bases, surrounding them. You can see from many of the PLAAF aircraft pictures that the bases are surrounded by urban areas. At the same time, its relatively difficult to tell based on China's geographical density if an arc is headed to just a base when various cities and towns are along that trajectory.

Missiles on arcing trajectories means China will assume the worst intentions and push the red button.

crobato said:

The country has grown to a point that major population concentrations have moved into once remote bases, surrounding them. You can see from many of the PLAAF aircraft pictures that the bases are surrounded by urban areas. At the same time, its relatively difficult to tell based on China's geographical density if an arc is headed to just a base when various cities and towns are along that trajectory.

Missiles on arcing trajectories means China will assume the worst intentions and push the red button.

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FriedRiceand Spice said:

Do you seriously think China or any country for that matter would wait for ballistic inbounds to actually hit their targets to see if they're using nuclear/conventional warheads before deciding on a response?

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The problem lies in the fact that China has ballistic missiles pointed at Taiwan, can be targeted against Japan Guam or South Korea, and it's unclear if any have nuclear warheads on them. The conventional Trident program is actually still being considered. It is merely an option for US forces. And believe me when I say China and others would know that this system is deployed. If China began using ballistic missiles in any anti-access and pre-emptive type of attack, it would clearly be an excellent fast response weapon against a vast array of targets...very quickly. If these Ohio class platforms were deployed somewhere off that continental shelf, it would provide flight times of 6 or less minutes from launch to impact, depending on the aim point. China would not have the response time to push any buttons. It would be overwhelmingly destructive. But it would be clearly conventional. And as such, it's true power is of that of a conventional deterrent weapon. You bet, it is an option. If China deploys conventional ballistic missiles against Western Pacific allies, the USA should do the same. And at any rate, I believe if it comes to it, we just may do it if we can't field the hypersonic cruise missile program due to a congress not interested in funding it. A ballistic missile launching China would need a fast response. Don't think that "miscalculation" (the common argument against it) would stop the DoD from pursuing it. The current plan is to modify 2 missiles in each Ohio submarine to carry 4 conventional warheads on those 2 missiles. But I believe a wider and larger threat would bring the Navy to conclude that fully loading 1 or 2 submarines would provide greater deterrent factor, and greater striking potential if needed. Right now there may not be a need for it, but ultimately if we do need it in the future, it will be modified and will be a usable option for the US. You can guarantee it.

Argument does not change. SSMs launched from a submarine will be taken as a nuclear attack. Do you seriously think one would be stupid enough to wait for the warheads to hit ground before you would determine if they are conventional or not?

The SSMs being launched against Taiwan are all land based and they're small short ranged ones., This is easily determined by radar and satellite right off as they launched. ICBMs are not going to be located near Taiwan or have trajectories heading to Taiwan. It is also quite clear that the Chinese won't be using nuclear weapons on Taiwan or Japan unless you hit them first with such. Or make them think you would. Nuclear weapons are not going to be put on small SCUD like DF-11s, which makes up the majority of the missiles aimed at Taiwan. DF-11s are all armed conventionally. You can certainly tell a DF-11 launch from a DF-5 or DF-31 which are your IRBMs and ICBMs.

If Chinese 094s would launch their ballistic missiles that too would be taken by the US as a preemptive nuclear attack.

For conventional use, there is the Ohio SSGN that launches Tomahawks. Cruise missiles are not going to be regarded as nuclear attack.